This was a Critical Mass event, which is why the bicyclists are taking up all of the street as a way to reclaim the streets and protest the lack of safety for riders under usual conditions. It’s not legal, but protests are never useful if they’re fully legal now, are they.
It’s functionally identical. The lane is occupied. Motorists cannot enter it, whether the cyclists are facing them or not.
It is not.
Cars follow the rules of traffic. This means you know basically what they will do. These people are just a mob. Look at how many of those bikes just cross solid lines. This is no where near the same. We can’t make progress if we start acting irrationally.
Also, cars don’t drive on the wrong side of the road into traffic and through red lights.
It’s not functionally identical, the function of the right lane is to move traffic in the opposite direction to the left. It would be absolute carnage if every other vehicle decided to disregard the rules of the road and use any lane they want because it would make it theirs.
Of course the traffic in their own lane has to stop when others are breaking the rules of the road as you don’t want to hurt anyone, but it’s still dangerous and stupid to ride a bike into oncoming traffic.